Sometimes you need a little more than words to say thank you and these brownies are just the way to do it!
I am obsessed with gooey fudgy brownies and the espresso in this recipe gives a nice kick and make the chocolate sing! If you are a cake brownie fan this is not the recipe for you. Did I mention you only need one pot to make these? One pot, a whisk and an 8×8 baking dish!
INGREDIENTS:
1½ sticks unsalted butter
1 c. brown sugar ¾ c. white sugar 3 lg. eggs
1 lg. egg yolk
2 tsp. vanilla
1 c. dark chocolate cocoa powder ⅓ c. AP flour
2 tsp. espresso powder
Pinch of salt
½ c. dark chocolate chips
DIRECTIONS:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line an 8 x 8 inch baking dish with parchment & grease. In med. sauce pan melt butter over medium heat. Remove from heat & whisk in brown & white sugar until smooth. Add eggs & egg yolk one at a time, whisking well after each addition. Stir in the vanilla. Add in cocoa powder, flour, espresso powder & salt. Stir until just combined. Stir in chocolate chips. Pour the mixture into the prepared pan and bake for 40-45 minutes. These are decedent dark chocolate goodness and just try not to eat more than one!
I have found two types of people – people who go gaga over cookie spread and those who look at you with a blank stare because they have never heard of it (I know what you’re thinking … how can someone not know what it is!?!). Regardless of which category you fall into it, I have found a recipe to feed your addiction or to start one!
My daughter was home sick on Monday with a stomach virus that has been running amok in our school. She was laying on the couch curled up in a ball watching a movie. I had already done the dishes, tidy up the house, vacuumed and taken down the Christmas tree – don’t judge. Side note: having a fake tree enables me to keep it up longer. I don’t apologize for this by any means … I love to decorate my tree to make it look pretty and the lights on at night is just too pretty to only have up for a few days.So since I had exhausted my ideas to entertain myself while my daughter was sick I decided to make brownies. I felt slightly bad about this since I knew she couldn’t eat any of the brownies I was going to make, but assured her I wouldn’t bring them to work so that she could enjoy them when she was feeling better.
I had some extra Biscoff spread from Christmas treats that I had been saving for just the right recipe. So I turned to my good friend Google and searched Biscoff spread brownies. There were a ton of different recipes. Blondies made with the spread incorporated, brownies with a Biscoff spread frosting, layered brownies, the list goes on and on, but one photo caught my eye! http://www.biscoff.com/create/recipes/195/fudgy-biscoff-swirl-brownies
Oh my goodness! AMAZING! The brownies are thick and fudge – and moist! The swirled spread on top pushes this one over the edge into a you can’t just stop at one even though they are decedent and delicious! You will not regret trying this recipe!
You can hear the crumble. Bit by bit, piece by piece. The sound echoing within the empty walls … the hollow finally showing it’s depth. During the day it is drowned out by the background noise of daily life. At night, alone in the dark, with nothing but your muffling sobs to drowned it out, the familiar shattering ensues.
It is one thing in life to know something. It is quite another to say it out loud. What makes it truly unbearable and downright full of shame and embarrassment is someone else saying it out loud. This is not the validation you want. This is not what you want to be recognized for or have attention drawn to. Yes, you know it. How can you not? You can “not” by ignoring it and acting as though it doesn’t exist. You have perfected the toddler mentality of if you can’t see it then neither can they. You know this isn’t true, but you still let yourself believe it. You have to in order to make it through. You tell yourself it isn’t that bad. That you can change it if you want to. It will be different this time. This is what has and always will define you, because you let it. Is it comfortable? No. Is it healthy? Hell no, and on so many levels. You know all of this … So does that make it worse? Does it make it worse to be an adult, know you have an issue and with a sound mind refuse to acknowledge it? Or is that the definition of scared? Maybe it is a fine line we walk between scared shitless and ignorance is bliss.
They say knowledge is power, so why after someone else tells you what you have known deep down in that hollow space, that you feel powerless and at your must vulnerable and/or shameful. How did you let it get this far. How did it domino so fast? Maybe you have to be so low you are forced to work up. Maybe you need to be scared so shitless that there really is only one choice … to move forward and to stare into the face of what ails you and tell it to sit down and shut up. The choice is yours and yours alone.
Salted Caramel: In a large sauce pan combined 1 can sweetened condenced milk and 3 bags of Werther’s Soft Caramels. Stir until all caramels are melted and it is smooth and bubbly. Add 1/4 tsp. fine sea salt and stir until it is distributed. Resisit licking the spoon … the caramel is scalding hot! Pour this mixture on top of your brownies and set in the fridge sans cover to firm up.
Chocolate Ganache: Keep in mind chocolate ganache (recipe in previous post here) needs to set at room temp. for about 12 hours to become solid and non-melting at room temp. If you make the ganache and pour it immediately over the brownies it will set up in the fridge but become very soft at room temp. I suggest letting the brownie and caramel set in the fridge while the ganache sets at room temp. After 10-12 hours you can beat the ganache with an electric mixer, just to make it spreadable and then slather it on.
Trifle. A retro hodge-podge of goodness. Think of it as an “everything but the kitchen sink” kind of dessert. You can go elaborate or simple, all homemade, all store bought or a little of each. The mostly store bought or “left over” option can be done in less than 10 minutes!
The trifle I made is layered with homemade whipped cream, Smucker’s Decadent Hot Fudge, Smucker’s Sea-salted Caramel, broken up brownies and Special K fudge covered pretzels.
You can use angel food cake, pound cake, devils food cake or any sturdy cake that can be cubed or broken without being all crumbles OR use your favorite Jell-O flavor made with the Jiggler recipe. Add some fruit or candy pieces or even pudding!! Drizzle on your favorite sauce toppings, add in some homemade whipped cream or Cool Whip and you have a stunning looking, mouth watering, crowd pleasing dessert.
The possibilities are endless and time is precious. Don’t fret when you forget you said you’d bring a dish to a potluck event or your kids class for a party. This dish will look like you slaved over it – even though you didn’t!! The crowd will love it and you didn’t have to break the bank or a sweat to make it; a win-win in my book. ENJOY!
I am a firm believer of everything happens for a reason and there is no such thing as a coincidence. There are little signs everywhere (each and every day) that sometimes we see and most of the times we don’t. Then out of left field (at least that’s how most of us feel … right?) this huge sign drops out of nowhere and hits us like a ton of bricks. What’s the saying? Hindsight is 20/20? Looking back we can somehow connect all the little signs that lead up to these huge events, but we often aren’t seeing them in the moment.
My loves on their first day of school! 2nd and 6th grade.
I had every intention last night to race through the evening to get everything done so that when my girls came home from karate and soccer I could hear all about their first day of school with all my attention just on them. Daddy was picking them up and I was cooking dinner, I had it all mapped out in my head. I had decided that while the chicken was cooking I would make a box of brownies and doctor them up with an amazing topping – quick and easy, and a blog post entry. Only as I was reaching for the measuring cup to add my water to the bowl that already contained the eggs, oil and bag of mix … it fell into the sink full of soapy water. GAH! There is no coming back from that. You can’t discretely fix that mistake! So, I cleaned up my mess and thought, well it just wasn’t in the cards to make this box of brownies tonight. I finished making supper and had great stories to listen to while we ate dinner as a family after their first day of school, and I was thankful.
Later on that evening, I decided that I needed to unwind and clear my head. For me baking is my zen, I get in a mindless groove and create scrumptious goodies for others. Bringing a smile to someones face and knowing that even if for only a few moments they get to forget about what ails them, then my job is done. I took out my trusty Betty Crocker’s Cookbook from the 70s (?) and dug out her brownie recipe. I figured if I had all the ingredients to make brownies from scratch then that is why my bowl of mix dumped. That was my sign. As I have said before, if you have quality pre-made items, USE THEM! Don’t feel like you HAVE to do everything homemade … just make sure it’s made with LOVE.
Betty Crocker’s Recipe
Brownie Ingredients:
4 oz. unsweetened chocolate
1/2 c. shortening
2 c. sugar
4 eggs
1 tsp. almond extract
1 1/4 c. AP flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt Directions: Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease 13 x 9 pan. Melt chocolate and shortening in a small pan on the stove over low heat. Stir constantly. Remove pan and pour mixture into a large bowl. Add in sugar, eggs and almond extract. Blend together until eggs and sugar are combined. Add in remaining ingredients and stir until just combined. Pour into prepared pan. Bake about 30 mins. or until batter has just left the sides of the pan and the top is dull looking. Do not over bake.
Digging through the cupboards I found I only had two cubes of unsweetened chocolate, but never fear, good ol’ Betty has the answer to everything! I just used the additional quantity in unsweetened cocoa powder and shortening – voila, problem solved. So I whipped up a batch of Betty’s brownies with a small tweek. I used almond extract instead of pure vanilla as I was making an Almond Joy topping for my brownies! Once the brownies were cooked and cooling I started on the yummy topping!
In a medium bowl I mixed 2 cups of shredded sweetened coconut, 1 cup of almonds, 1 cup of mini chocolate chips and 1 can of sweetened condensed milk. Can we just take a moment to relish in how amazing sweetened condensed milk is? There are two things that come from cans that I can lick the spoon after … sweetened condensed milk and tomato paste (weird … I know). Once it is all mixed, try not eat it all before you spread this gooey deliciousness onto the brownies!
You can cheat and not wait for the brownies to cool before spreading this on top, but be sure to remember that the mixture is thick and spreads rough. Then just stick them in the fridge (so the chips don’t melt) to cool. These are sinfully rich. I was able to cut mine into 32 squares easily. ENJOY!
I have found two types of people – people who go gaga over cookie spread and those who look at you with a blank stare because they have never heard of it (I know what you’re thinking … how can someone not know what it is!?!). Regardless of which category you fall into it, I have found a recipe to feed your addiction or to start one!
Have Sweets, Will Share. 